Metro News & Reviews

Streetsblog L.A. logging off due to lack of funding

Streetsblog L.A. is going away. But the team promises a new site is coming in its wake.

Those of you who read our daily Transportation Headlines are well aware of Streetsblog L.A.’s excellent coverage of the mobility issues facing our region – in fact the site was number one on our list of “10 essential Los Angeles transportation blogs.” At the time of that posting there were plans for expansion, including a team of freelance writers, Spanish language stories and expanded video content.

Unfortunately those plans, at least from the site we know as Streetsblog L.A., won’t be realized due to a lack of local funding that is forcing the blog to shut down on July 23.

This news was revealed in a post today by Streetsblog L.A.’s blogger extraordinaire Damien Newton – a guy who came onto the scene three years ago and quickly created the premiere source for transportation news in L.A. Although Damien did most of the street level work reporting here in L.A., he notes the Streetsblog L.A. is part of larger project and unfortunately – unlike sister sites Streetsblog New York and Streetsblog San Francisco, the L.A. outpost was never able to find a local funding source to keep it viable.

The good news is that according to Damien, the death of Streetsblog L.A. doesn’t mean the death of great independent reporting of L.A.’s changing streets:

…myself and a team of names that you would certainly recognize will be returning with a new locally produced, written, edited, and funded website. We don’t have all the details worked out yet, but when we do we won’t be shy about sharing them.

While we here at The Source are sad to see Streetsblog L.A. go, we eagerly anticipate the new blog and can’t wait to start linking to it in our daily Transportation Headlines.